BUCHANAN, CLAUDIUS: A pioneer of modern
Anglican missionary work in India; b. at Cambuslang,
near Glasgow, Mar. 12, 1766; d. at Broxbourne
(5 m. s.e. of Hertford), Hertfordshire, Feb.
9, 1815. At sixteen he went to the University of
Glasgow, intending to study law, but, after finishing
his course, spent three years in a careless wandering
life. Smitten by repentance, he placed himself
under the care of John Newton, the celebrated
evangelical preacher in London, one of whose
friends enabled him to spend four years at Cambridge.
In 1796 he went to Calcutta as a chaplain
in the East India Company's service. He found
the conditions there very unfavorable for earnest
work. All the Company was willing to do for
sixty millions of souls was to place a chaplain here
and there, who was told not to meddle with the
native population. While Buchanan was waiting
for a chance to do real work, he learned Hindustani
and Persian. In 1800, being transferred to Calcutta
itself, he found a like-minded helper in Lord
Mornington (later Marquis of Wellesley), the
Governor-general, who founded a college in Calcutta
for the teaching of the Oriental languages
and placed Buchanan in charge of it. It was closed,
however, three years later, and all looked as dark
as ever. But after a while a new institute was
founded, on a smaller scale, and Buchanan took
hope once more. In 1805 he published his Expediency
of an Ecclesiastical Establishment for
India, in which he developed the first plan for the
establishment of regular dioceses and bishops.
While waiting for his seed to bear fruit, he translated
the New Testament into Hindustani and
Persian, and founded an institute for such work.
In 1806 he made an extended journey along the
Malabar coast, partly for his health and partly
in the missionary interest, publishing his observations
in Christian Researches in Asia (Cambridge,
1811, new ed., London, 1840). He returned to
Calcutta in 1807, full of plans for which the time
was once more unfavorable. Lord Wellesley had
been recalled, and his successor, Lord Minto, looked
coldly on such projects, as did the Company in
general. To push his views in England was the
most necessary thing, and Buchanan returned
thither in 1808 to press upon the ministry the
setting up of a theological seminary in each presidency,
the granting of licenses to missionaries,
and the appointment of bishops. Lord Liverpool
approved this plan, but the House of Commons
agreed to the appointment of only one bishop.
Middleton, the first bishop of Calcutta, was consecrated

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in 1816, and when his successor was
provided with suffragans for Madras and Bombay,
Buchanan's plan had been realized in its essentials,
though he did not live to see it.